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Patricia Ann Collins can thank her lucky stars, God or whoever it is that she wants to thank that her rear end hasn't been sitting in jail since her ignorance and stupidity caused the death of an innocent person because of her drunk driving or whatever else was revealed in the toxicology reports from her blood test the night she caused the death of Officer Crapse.

Vehicular homicide is nothing like a murder charge. It allows the entire incident to be treated as an accident. She'll be remorseful, contrite, yada yadda yadda....and before she is 30, she'll be able to party-hearty again. In the meantime, three children will go fatherless for life.

Be sure to thank all the lawmakers for allowing a serious crime to be treated so casually. Too bad the DA didn't have the guts to seek a murder charge against her. After all, her continual drinking habit was no accident.

I realize you are angry and have every reason in the world to be, but as far as the snide comment about women not being allowed to drive, keep that little gem to yourself. There are plenty of horrible male drivers too. You are probably one of them.

To the person that knows Collins and came to her defense. You said you've known her for years, she would never have caused an accident, that she must have had a physical problem of some sort. What do you have to say now?

The deputy's family has been changed forever. Nothing can bring him back to them. Their loss is permanent. The young woman needs to be punished, if for no other reason than to demonstrate to others that we will not tolerate such behavior and the senseless loss of life that it causes. If she has any conscience at all, I am sure that she is most likely tortured by what she has done. That is how it should be.

When I had my own practice I handled a few DUI cases for clients whose young adult children had had a few too many and then got behind the wheel. Thankfully, none of them ever hurt anyone. When I met with them, I usually tried to be as stern with them as the judge was going to be. I did it to try to help wake them up to the gravity of what they had done. Too many lose their lives every day on our roads because of alcohol related accidents. If you have young drivers in your family, the real dangers of drinking and driving need to be brought home to them and reinforced constantly.

I just read the GSP crash report at http://ftpcontent.worldnow.com/wtoc/web/crashreport.pdf What do you want to bet her lawyer will try to make a big deal out of the deputy's not wearing his seat belt (not that a lap-and-shoulder belt would have done any good in THAT crash as it was severe enough to have him trapped in the vehicle) and/or that the deputy's driver's license was expired (neither of which contributed to the crash)?

If I remember right she was salutatorian or something like that and also a Georgia Tech graduate, rather nerdy, and didn't party that much. She just got unlucky. Most people who responded to this have driven under the influence at least once. Just the time that she did, she really messed up.